tonight, show them the money. >> we're still stunned by what's happened. >> america's power ball winners, now $293 million richer. >> i called my husband, i said i think i'm having a heart attack. >> can they ever be the same? i will talk to their closest friends. also, back on the campaign trail. >> we can solve these problems. >> with 32 days to go, will you be paying higher taxes? my political all-stars weigh in on battleground america. and against all odds, after sandusky, penn state's incredible comeback. my exclusive interview with the

coach of the year. and a reunion with a dear old friend whose bark is as bad as her bite. sharon osbourne. her incredible year of highs and lows and how she's rebuilding her life after facing a terrible health prognosis. >> i couldn't see myself going through chemoagain. >> this is "piers morgan tonight." good evening. who ever thinks the american dream is dead or dying should meet mark and cindy hill, a missouri couple who live a very ordinary life. at least that's what they were doing until wednesday and a little thing called power ball came along. sure, the odds were 1 in 175 million, but like everybody else in america, pretty much everyone else, they bought a ticket. wouldn't you know it, they won. sharing the jackpot with another lucky winner. today, the hills are holding a check in their hands for a cool $293 million. not surprisingly, they are in a state of shock. while we wait for them to absorb what's happened, i talked to two

people who know them better than most. joining me now, sandra and walt stubbs, good close friends of power ball winners, mark and cindy hill. welcome to you both. >> thank you. >> thank you. >> what an amazing story. tell me about these friends of yours who have suddenly gone from regular struggling american family to fabulously rich. >> well, mark and cindy went to high school with us, and you know, just an amazing story. just great people. salt of the earth. they bought the ticket and one day they were struggling like everybody else and now they're millionaires. >> what's amazing is that mark was laid off in 2010 from work, cindy then took time off work to care for the baby they adopted from china, and they were hoping to adopt another child, but

finances were tight and so on. now of course they can afford to do all this. but they seem very decent, i say ordinary, i don't mean ordinary in any kind of negative way, i just mean regular americans. >> yes. they are very grounded. they have strong bonds with their family. they really enjoy their family. they will definitely take care of their family now. >> let's play a little clip, this is of cindy, who bought the ticket, at the press conference earlier. >> i didn't have my glasses and i was thinking is that the right numbers, is that the right numbers? and i was shaking and i called my husband, i said i think i'm having a heart attack, god blessed us with this. and for some reason, he put it in our hands. i think to make sure that it goes to the right things. and -- but we were blessed before we ever won this. >> how do you guys find out about this, walt?

>> since we're pretty familiar in the community, several people in the community started texting us about, oh, 9:00 that morning, and you know, of course, there are no secrets in a small town so everybody was pretty much calling around saying hey, he won, and mark put it on his facebook which i was totally amazed that he did that. so everybody pretty much knew. >> it's a lovely story. dearborn in missouri is a small place. as you say, everybody knows each other. cindy and mark have three grown-up sons, jason, cody and jared and a 6-year-old adopted daughter, jaden, from china. it really is a wonderful pre-holiday story, isn't it? >> yes. it is. it's just a blessing. they couldn't have had a better couple to get it because they will definitely take care of the family but they are also really involved in the community. we're really happy for them. >> do you know how they are going to spend the money, sandra? have they given any indication

to you? >> all they said today was that they were definitely going to take care of their family and their grandchildren and set up college funds for them, and then they had some charities they are really into the adoption and so i know that they were possibly thinking about getting another child, and making sure that the adoption community, you know, gets some of their money. >> walt, did you buy tickets yourselves for this powerball? >> we did. we did. we were watching but you know what, if we can't win, we're happy that they're the ones that won. >> yes. >> if i bought a ticket and my best mates won, a little part of me would be like oh, god, why not me? >> you know what, i think that it's important. mark and cindy are great people, i think that they will do a good job taking care of this money

and they're just special people. sorry we didn't win but glad they did. >> very glad. >> what's going to happen to mark's job now with all this? >> he's not going back to work. cindy -- >> i'll bet he isn't. >> cindy isn't going to an interview. cindy had an interview scheduled for today and she did not go to that, either. >> no, i would imagine work is the last thing on their minds. but it's a great story. i'm very thrilled for your friends. the mere fact you're also happy for them says it all. they are obviously lovely people and exactly the kind of people you hope win something like the powerball. so thank you for joining me. please pass on my very sincere congratulations to them and if they want to come on this show and talk about it, i would love to see them. >> we'll let them know. >> thank you. >> thanks. now to another long shot winner. the year of enormous scandal and shame for penn state and its football team. tonight, an extraordinary story of hope and healing. against the odds, the nittany lions and its head coach, bill

o'brien, led to an incredible 8-4 season. that's not all. he was just named big ten coach of the year. coach bill o'brien joins me now for an exclusive interview. coach o'brien, welcome to you. >> hey, piers, how are you doing? thanks for having me on tonight. >> you've had this extraordinary run which really nobody was expecting. it started obviously amid extremely difficult circumstances. when you took over from the legendary joe paterno with all the shame and scandal that had befallen penn state, be honest with me, what was really going through your mind? >> well, i knew that it was going to be a difficult challenge and so the first thing i tried to do was put together a great coaching staff and i think that's what we've done here. then obviously, we spent a lot of time with the players and we talked to the players about moving forward and what this university was all about, which was a great chance to get a fantastic education and play good football, and so we weren't here then, so we knew that this

was a chance for us as a new football coaching staff to help these kids and help this athletic department and this university move forward. >> to put it in perspective, let's remind people of the sanctions that were laid down after the scandal. a $60 million fine, a four-year bowl ban, all wins vacated, scholarships cut for four years. on the back of that, 15 players left, 31 fourth and fifth year seniors stayed. how did you persuade the ones who stayed to stay? because clearly, it wasn't going to be to their footballing advantage necessarily. >> right. you know, it was in the summertime when the sanctions came out and right away, we had a team meeting that day, and we talked about a lot of different things but we talked about the commitment that they had made to each other and the commitment that they had made to the football program and to the university. and that there was still the education here and the ability

to receive a world renowned degree. that wasn't changing. they were going to be able to play football in front of 100,000 fans. that wasn't changing. and they knew at the end of the day that they were going to be able to play a lot of football in a great conference on tv and so that was something that they knew in their minds was not changed. so at the end of the day, we had a lot of guys that chose to stay with us. we had a series of team meetings after that leading up to training camp and we had a fantastic senior class that helped keep it all together. >> you lost the first two games of the season. i would imagine your heart was right in your mouth at that point. but since then, incredible statistics. 8 for 4 overall season, 6 for 2 big ten record. you were named big ten coach of the year by the media and fellow coaches. you were the first penn state first year coach to win eight games in 126 years of the program, and many of the players received big ten honors as well. a quite incredible array of honors given where you started

from. >> well, i think it was a difficult beginning. the guys were learning a new system on offense and defense and still a lot of the things that we were doing football wise here were different than what they had done in the past and there were growing pains early in the season. i think the guys were frustrated because we all knew that we had the makings of a good football team. i will never forget the monday after the virginia game where we came back to work, our guys really practiced hard that day and we knew then as a coaching staff we had a resilient bunch of guys that were eventually not going to be denied to win some games. we ended up beating navy that week and we got on a little bit of a roll which was good, and we ended up 8-4 like you said, and it was a good start to this new era of penn state football. >> how have you dealt with the obvious which is the difficulty i guess in rebuilding trust with fans, with parents in particular, of boys now playing at penn state after the

appalling crimes of jerry sandusky? how have you dealt with that, how have you talked to your players about that and indeed, to the parents? how have you reassured everybody that there's a whole new world now at penn state and they don't have to worry about it? >> well, i believe that we have great communication with our players, number one. we talk to our players all the time. we have good communication with the parents of our players. i think they feel good about the direction of the football program. one of the things that we've done here, piers, i believe, is we've helped move the community forward. there's many things that we do in the community that help the state college community but probably number one is as we move forward, is going to make sure we do our part to put an end to child abuse. we work with the pennsylvania coalition against rape and that's something that is a partnership that will continue as long as i'm here. so i think our guys are a little bit wise beyond their years.

they understand the reason that we're in the position that we're in because of the sanctions that came down. they know why those sanctions came down and it's a little bit more than football to these guys. they understand that. they're going to do their part in the community and that's what we're trying to do, in addition to going to class and playing good football. >> what are your thoughts personally towards joe paterno and indeed, towards jerry sandusky? >> well, you know, i'll start with coach paterno. you know, obviously you look at the body of work and the body of work that he had here as the football coach was tremendous. he graduated 90% of his players and he won a lot of football games here. i think that, you know, i'm just a football coach so i'm not here to judge anybody's legacy. all i will tell you is that it's my job to move this football program forward and one of the reasons and one of the ways that we move it forward is by making sure that we graduate our players and that we play good football on saturdays.

as far as jerry sandusky goes, you know, he's in jail and he's paying for his crimes and you know, we've moved forward as a university and we're looking forward to the future. >> well, you certainly have moved forward, coach o'brien. it's been an astonishing transformation. i congratulate you personally on the achievements you've had and wish you continued good success. thank you for joining me. >> thank you, piers. coming next, battleground america and the fight over your looming tax bill. joy's christmas shopping and was looking at best buy for the latest smartphone. you wanna see if walmart has the same phone, for less? let's see! samsung galaxy s3 --- you could save over $50. no way! and -- you get a $100 gift card. are you serious?! yes! see for yourself how much you can save on the smartphones you want for christmas. walmart. without freshly-made pasta. you could also cut corners by making it without 100% real cheddar cheese. but then...it wouldn't be stouffer's mac & cheese. just one of over 70 satisfying recipes for one from stouffer's.

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if congress does nothing, every family in america will see their income taxes automatically go up on january 1st. i'm assuming that doesn't sound too good to you. that's sort of like the lump of coal you get for christmas. that's a scrooge christmas. >> president obama in a factory outside philadelphia today, pushing his financial plan. make no mistake, it's all about your tax bills and if washington can make a deal before you start paying more. with me is democratic strategist marjorie cliften and gerri jacobus. welcome to you both. listening to john boehner today and the president, it's pretty clear there's no deal anywhere near being settled here. i don't know about you, i'm just getting really bored with it. why don't they just get round a

table and get it done? let me start with you gerri. >> i think the president going to pennsylvania to the tinker toy plant on a campaign stop essentially is probably not going to go over as well as he thinks it does, particularly since we thought we were done with that. we just went through it a few weeks ago. thought campaign stops were over and he inflicts this on us again. the american people expect him to sit down with the republicans in congress and work this out. now, a year ago or so, last year, he agreed to $800 billion in tax hikes. that's kind of where the number was. he comes back with twice that and when he gets obviously a no from republicans, you don't double it and say that's okay. he immediately goes out on the campaign trail so he does need to come back to washington, they need to sit down. that's what the american people expect them to do. >> i mean, the bottom line is he's just been re-elected, he's the winner. the republicans were vanquished and i suspect president obama says i'll be calling the shots here. >> there is still a month left. we've got to have something to talk about for the rest of the month, right?

you have to kind of look at this as sort of a poker game. everybody's going to sort of try to barter for as best a deal as they can get and know they are going to have to make concessions along the way. what he did is he went for it. he said look, i'm going to do $1.6 trillion in tax hikes, only $400 billion in cuts. he conveniently did not cut social security, medicare and medicaid which poll as the most popular programs and things that americans actually want. and if you look at it, 60% of americans actually support the idea of raising taxes and that of course goes beyond those that just voted for him. so he's going with what are the popular issues that i know i can get americans around me and i'm going to put republicans in a really tight spot where they're going to have to either say look, we're going to make cuts to programs that we know that you like and frankly, they know that it's going to be bad for republicans if a deal doesn't get done. so a lot's still happening behind the scenes and what we're hearing publicly is a lot of posturing in that poker game happening. >> yeah. the problems of republicans it seems to me is they've had this completely intransigent position

driven by grover norquist, but all the polls say two-thirds of americans are quite happy for the wealthier to pay more taxes in america. i think they should just get on with it and suck it up. >> well, it was a relatively close election but the president did win anhe has to own this. we also know that the "washington post" said this, and if you just close the loopholes and deductions on the folks instead of just raising their tax rates outright, you can come up with close to that $800 billion that they did agree on last year. you get to about 750. to come in with a $1.6 trillion as your starting point, i can't believe it's serious. i don't blame the leadership, mcconnell apparently burst -- senator mcconnell burst out laughing. i don't blame him because it's absolutely ridiculous to come back from last year with twice the amount. it's not a serious offer and i think it's in bad form for the president to go out on this campaign stop. he needs to sit down and work with republicans. we understand that the president won and the house is still in

republican hands. both sides need to understand that. but the president did not -- it wasn't a landslide. he did win. he's also got to own this. it seems to me and i think this is going to seem more american people are going to start seeing this, too, he doesn't really want to come to a deal. he doesn't want to show leadership and gets this done. it seems he wants to stick the shiv in their back. people expect him to do his job. this is an opportunity for leadership. he should take it, quite frankly. >> i would say that -- >> it wasn't a landslide but it was a fair beating. to give you some idea just how bad mitt romney lost, look at this picture of him. this is apparently mitt romney at a mcdonald's on the same day that he had lunch with the president, actually having a mcflurry. that is how bad things have got. >> i don't think it's bad. >> you are trying to convince me it wasn't a terrible beating. look at the man. >> it's painful. it was painful but it wasn't

like the reagan/mondale, that kind of situation. that's a great picture of mitt romney. i don't think -- he's probably got, the money the guy has, he goes to mcdonald's. sometimes that's why rich people are rich. they don't waste their money. >> i know he likes mcdonald's, actually. when i interviewed him in london in the summer, it was literally an hour after he had come out with all these criticism of the olympics and how badly it was all being organized by the british and of course, the british took very badly to his comments, and mitt romney arrived at the location for our interview and all he said to me was i need a mcdonald's and i need it fast. >> sometimes you just need your mcdonald's. >> i think he needs these things as a comfort blanket before tricky meetings. >> we all do. >> thank you both very much indeed for joining me. >> thank you. >> no problem. coming up next, my emotional interview with a very good old friend who has got a little nip to her bite. sharon osbourne on her life-changing year. let's say you want to get ahead in your career.

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my relationship with sharon osbourne has always been, well, let's just say a little complicated. we spent a lot of time together onstage and off. we were both judges on "america's got talent" for four very, very long years. but a lot has changed since then. joining me now exclusively is sharon osbourne, co-host of cbs' "the talk" and a woman that despite everything, i love dearly. how are you? >> i love you more, by the way, and i'm fine. and it was five years we worked together. >> was it really? >> five years. >> god. it was fun, though, wasn't it? >> we had a blast, didn't we? >> you do look great, i've got to say. despite this, you have been through this horrific experience. you had a double mastectomy. tell me what happened. last i saw you, you were blooming in good health. >> i was. okay.

what happened was, and i had this last january, but i just kept quiet about it because it was my -- it was elective surgery. i decided i wanted to do this because the year before, i had had a test called the genome test. do you remember genome got in touch with ozzie and said we want to test you, because we have no idea why you're still alive, with everything you've gone through, and if you can imagine a dna but like a million times more complex than that, that's what the genome test is. they did ozzie, they did me and it came back that i carried -- i knew i had the cancer gene but the breast cancer gene and i had already had the colon cancer, and i just couldn't -- i couldn't deal with it. >> having been through cancer once, what did you feel? you have had, as we will come to later, a very traumatic year already in many ways with jack and other things. how did you feel when you got

this back and thought here we go again? >> i couldn't see myself going through chemo again. that was really -- it's not the operation for it, it's not any of that. it's the chemo that really gets you and i just thought i don't want to do it and if i can avoid it, then i will, and i don't want to keep going to be tested every six months, to have a mammogram. and i had implants in, anyway, so i had really big -- >> i remember. >> yeah. oh, i flashed you. that's right. >> you may remember i woke up on the "america's got talent" private plane flying from chicago to los angeles to find your naked breasts in all their glory right in my face. >> yes. >> being photographed by nick cannon and howie mandel. not the way i like to wake up. >> well, i thought it was a nice way to wake you up and say put your seat belt on, piers, we're landing. but anyway, nick's still got the

pictures, by the way. >> i know he does. >> anyway, i had, you know, those fun bags as ozzie calls them, put in, and one of them had leaked very badly so my breasts were odd-sized. i got the cancer gene and i thought this is ridiculous. so i went in and they just took everything away. >> what does it -- to be a woman going through that, for most women it would be like the ultimate nightmare. i read this interview you gave, the first i heard about it was hello magazine dropped and there's this amazing interview. i was really struck by even someone as tough as you waking up the next day and you've had this operation which every woman would dread. how did you feel? >> relieved. >> really. >> yeah, i did. i fell really relieved.

i felt no more squishing in that mammogram because they hurt, especially with the fun bags. so it was like just relieved. that's the way i felt. and i did it the way i did it because i didn't want to worry friends and family. i just didn't -- i didn't want a big to-do about it. >> i will put the other side to this. 90% of women who have the double mastectomy because they're worried about cancer recurring probably do so unnecessarily in the sense that statistically, actually it's unlikely. my reaction to that survey was well, it's fine if you're in the 90%, not so good if you're in the 10%. is that what went through your mind, even if there's 1% chance, you don't want to take it? >> no, because i never -- i never believe those surveys, anyway, because they're always wrong. they're always done by insurance companies that don't want to pay out to have it done. it's like, you know, they say

oh, you only have a mammogram if you're over 40. well, i know so many girls in their 20s and 30s that have had breast cancer. they say the same with colon cancer. you only have the test if you're 50. well, you know what, i was going through treatment with a girl of 19 who died of it. so that's all rubbish. i was lucky enough to be able to make the decision and i was blessed and lucky, and you know, for me, the odds weren't really on my side, with age and you know, my history. so i'm like i don't want to roll the dice on this one. >> let's take a short break, sharon, come back and talk about jack. jack came on the show, very moving interview, actually, which i know you watched. let's talk about how he's doing next. just got married. >> he did. [ male announcer ] imagine facing the day with less chronic osteoarthritis pain.

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the osbournes have had more than their share of ups and downs. back with me, the family matriarch, sharon osbourne.

jack recently went through his own health scare which i know was very upsetting to you. you called me and you were in floods of tears a few weeks before it all came out. i knew because this is your boy, you are the mother hen. you're the lioness. this is one of your pride. let's see what jack said to me when he came on the show. what is the family attitude to this? how have your mom and dad been? >> you know, i think my mom and dad took the news far worse than i did. they were instantly i think in a very kind of parental kind of way thought is it our fault, what could we have done, you know, things like that. and really, they have a tendency to do that a lot about everything. >> your mom is an emotional woman. >> she is. >> for good and bad. see, there you go again. very difficult for you, that, wasn't it? i remember you were really beside yourself because you couldn't believe and you have been through so much, the osbournes, so well documented, all the stuff you've had to go through, your cancer, ozzie nearly dying and so on.

now you're hit with jack getting this horrible disease in his 20s. did you fear the worst when you first heard? because you know enough about the disease to make any kind of considered opinion. >> i was hit badly because of jack's age and because jk, when he became clean and sober, it's ten years ago now, he turned to climbing mountains, jumping out of helicopters, bungee jumping, doing all the most outrageous things and he lived for that. it made him feel great. it set him goals in life that he would achieve. and the thought of him not being able to live the life that he wanted to was devastating to me at 26. and then you think maybe i did something when i was pregnant because nobody knows how you get it. nobody knows. so you know, i kept going over everything with myself and

doubting myself and it's an awful thing. >> he had a little baby and he also got married in hawaii on october 7th. there's some lovely pictures from the wedding here. looked an amazing event. >> it was lovely. i cried for two days. that's all i did. look at me. i'm crying there. there's little pearl. i'm crying there. that's all i did. >> he's a lovely guy, jack. >> look at me. >> i know. you never stop booing the whole time, did you? >> pathetic. >> ozzie looks almost genteel these days. what happened to the wild man? smart, hair slicked back. >> didn't he look lovely? >> he's not trying to bite the baby, is he? >> she's trying to bite him. >> that must have been a very special day, after all you have been through with jack, to be able to be there on his wedding day. >> all that he had been through that year was amazing and it was just a time, you know, you say

your wedding is the most important day and to the day i die, i only have amazing feelings and thoughts of that day. >> let's turn to perhaps not such good thoughts. america's got talent. so i left to come here and do this show and thought leaving it in good hands, and it all went to hell in a hand cart. >> what happened? what happened? >> they were clearly missing me, you clearly missing me. >> excuse me, piers, when you were there, we debuted at 16 1/2 million. you leave, we're at 10. >> what went wrong? >> i do not know. i do not know. i think that i didn't see the point of moving to new york. i didn't see what that does. i don't think a viewer at home that watches that show goes they really don't care whether it's filmed in philadelphia or los angeles or new york. what does it matter to them? they are at home watching the tv. >> it's moved because of how it's done because he does a radio show there.

i got the feeling watching her, who i absolutely love, an amazing talent, but i just got the feeling it was a bit uncomfortable not being able to be the real howard stern because of the nature of a family show like "america's got talent." did you feel that? >> i thought he handled himself really well because we know him as the howard stern of radio and he's a big old softy. he's a big old softy. in commercial breaks, i would ask him all filthy dirty sexual questions and he would look at me and go why are you talking to me like this. because this is what you do to me when i'm on your radio show. so i would ask him all these awful sexual questions. he's fabulous. i don't know, i don't know whether we all did have that chemistry that was broken and so the show went. >> you had a big falling-out with nbc, mainly because jack was going to do some shows with them, then they pulled the plug and you felt strongly about that.

lot of speculation about it. what was the truth? >> they did offer jack the job. why would he be in hand of a contract, the contract wasn't signed, but also, you know that you go and do a job and you sign the contract halfway through. i worked for this year for nbc for two months without signing a contract. that comes after. he was in hand of a contract. two days before he was due to start, they called and said it was too much of a responsibility, jack was too much, so no. but the thing was, i can understand what they were saying. it was the way that they did it. it was just the way they did it. and then they offered him well, what do you want, money, we'll pay you. no, he doesn't want money. he wants his dignity, he wants his pride. he could do this. but then as it happens, the way the show turned out, it had a curse on it. the show did terrible, people didn't like it, it was so, you know -- >> karma. >> you know, the karma truck was

parked outside nbc that week. had nothing to do with me. >> you and simon cowell have had a love/hate relationship over the years but there are some rumors you may go back perhaps to one of his shows, x factor. >> you know what he's like? he's such a tart. he's like a big brother. you love your brother, but sometimes you don't like him very much, do you. so we're like this at each other. we take jabs at each other all the time. but i tell you something, like you, whenever you're in trouble, simon is right there, as you are. so i can't say a bad thing about him. >> which of the other talent shows do you watch? do you like any of them? >> i watch them all. i love to see what's going on because i'm addicted to tv. >> who is the worst judge on television at the moment? >> oh, dear. oh, that's awful. >> i prefer that to the best one. the best one's an american question. the british question is who's the worst. >> oh, dear.

probably, i know he's going to kill me and he's the head of ozzie's record company, and i shouldn't say this, but probably l.a. reed. i think he's boring. >> you just ruined ozzie's record deal. >> i know, but he's doing -- it's like l.a., get back to the bloody record company and sell some records and stop being a silly judge. that's all i have to say. i mean, he's got all the credibility, everything, but stop trying to be mr. show biz and get back to run sony. really. >> we haven't talked about the talk. the talk is terrific and you are terrific on it every weekday. am i allowed back soon? >> i would love you to come back. >> i'm available. >> when are you in new york next? >> next week. >> oh, good. well then, you can come on our show. we're in new york. >> excellent. i shall see you in the big apple. >> i love you. would you like another picture? >> do you know what, i just had my tea. >> okay. forget it. >> sharon, lovely to see you. >> i love you, piers.

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robert zemeckis is an oscar winner and a man behind some of hollywood's biggest hits. he may be in line for another award for his movie "flight" starring denzel washington. we will come to why you're my favorite director in a moment. first let's come to "flight." it's a thrilling movie starring one of the great actors of this generation, denzel washington. the reason it's so thrilling, it contains just this incredible plane crash scene, the likes of which no one has ever seen on the big screen before. let's take a little look and discuss this afterwards. >> speed brake. >> speed brake. >> margaret, now!

>> it goes on and on, like 20 minutes long the plane crash scene and it is thrilling cinema. was it that, was it the concept of being able to create this incredible scene that really attracted you to the movie? >> well, actually, you know, having this plane crash in the movie was a detriment to my possible decision because i had done a plane crash in "castaway" with tom hanks. my representatives and my partners were thinking, you're going to do another plane crash. but what really attracted me to the piece was denzel's character. such a brilliantly written screenplay and great character that to not do the plane crash just because i'd done another one would have been not a very smart thing to do. so the challenge was to do the plane crash even better than in the last film. >> and the theme of the movie is very much around denzel's character who is a hero pilot but it turns out he has an addiction, substance problem. makes it a very complex, quite unpredictable movie right to the end.

you're not quite sure how this is all going to play out. you need an actor of his kind of brilliance, don't you? >> absolutely. >> tell me about work with denzel washington. >> you need an actor who obviously is a magnificent actor. denzel is one of the best that has ever lived. and you need someone who has got charm, gravitas, a certain amount of swagger and denzel brought all that to the part. so, you know, what he did so brilliantly in the movie is he keeps the audience off balance. they aren't quite sure where they are falling off in the sort of morality of his situation. >> does he deserve an oscar, do you think? >> oh, absolutely. >> you would say that. >> i would say that, but i'm saying that but it's such a brilliant performance. i was -- i mean, every day when i was standing behind the camera watching him work, his choices were just astounding. >> you are 61 years old, looking very good, if you don't mind me saying, robert. you directed 16 movies that have grossed nearly $4 billion worldwide. do you ever stop and think about

that? >> you know, i don't think about it that often. you know, i guess it's because i -- you know, i just -- i never have made a movie thinking about the money. i've only ever made a movie thinking about, you know, can i make this a good movie. and the money has come with, you know, as frosting on the cake, so to speak. >> you said that -- a great quote. i'm really tired of making these huge over100 million movies where they literally mean life and death for a studio. everyone is hysterical. this was quite a relatively lower budget movie. >> this is the lowest budget movie in today's dollars that i made since i made by second film "used cars." >> about $30 million? >> $31 million. >> and it's grossed what so far? >> about $77 million, $78 million. >> how do you quantify in the modern game of movies a real success? >> for me, my -- i have done this my entire career. if the film makes $1 profit, i'm

happy because then the film exists and nobody got hurt and that's my job. but that's the way i've always looked at it. >> who is, to you, a great actor or actress, other than denzel? what does it take to be really top draw? >> well, i've worked with a lot of great actors. i've worked with tom hanks three times. he's as great as they get. i've worked with meryl streep, ray winstone. i mean, i've been very fortunate in my career, i've worked with tremendous, tremendous actors. i think, you know, what it takes to be a great actor is the ability to just understand whatever that -- wherever that magical thing that they are able to do to know what the character is feeling and then to be able to evoke that somehow through what it is that they do. >> now there is another option, of course, for best actor at the oscars. i want to play you a little clip to show the viewers what i mean

because it's going to be neck and neck with denzel. >> a real american hero. is that your reading of it? yep, absolutely. denzel, i hear is pretty worried about this. >> i tell you. >> the phrase scene stealer has been used. >> when we were shooting that scene he's saying, i don't know. i don't know if i like this guy in the scene with me here. he's going to steal all my thunder. >> it's a terrific film. it's great to play a tiny part in it. >> pleasure to have you. >> you're going to be having a lot of fun at the oscars. >> great to see you. we'll be right back. dache. trust me, this is new bayer migraine. [ male announcer ] it's the power of aspirin plus more in a triple action formula to relieve your tough migraines. new bayer migraine formula. cool, you found it. wow. nice place. yeah. [ chuckles ] the family thinks i'm out shipping these. smooth move. you used priority mail flat-rate boxes. if it fits, it ships for a low, flat rate.

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this sunday night is "cnn heroes: an annual tribute." the top ten heroes of the year. it can help our honorees do more to help others. a hero from 2010 is one example. he's teaming up with musician kid rock to get injured vets into new homes for free. >> dan walrath has donated nearly 50 custom homes to returning veterans. it is work he was honored at the cnn heroes all-star tribute where he first teamed up with

rock icon and michigan native kid rock. >> i had the pleasure of him introducing me that night. we kept in touch and did a home together. he said he'd like to sponsor one. here we are today. >> my philosophy is always help your neighbor first. we find people who really want to better themselves who got a great attitude. >> sergeant daven dumar who lost his leg in an ied explosion continues treatment at the walter reed army medical center where he married his wife dana last year. they are planning to return to michigan to take their first steps as husband and wife. >> we both definitely want to move back here. so it will be nice and close to family. >> little do they know what wallwrath and kid rock have in store for their family. >> first of all, welcome home. >> thank you. >> thank you for your service. you have a brand new home coming right across the street.